Posted tagged ‘Taito’

UPDATE: Please note that for the latest news, go to ARCADEHEROES.COM. The site made a major move after the post below but we have kept doing the same thing, reporting on the world of arcades.

While we eagerly await news from the Sega Private Show to come about, including more information on GRID and Let’s Go Island, let’s take another look at the recent JAMMA show that took place in Japan.

First off, Taito released a video featuring an overview of their booth, which includes the first footage of their new racing title, Battle Gear Spin Wheel. This one won’t have any trouble earning it’s place on the list of “quirky” arcade titles as you will see briefly below.

Here is a brief look at the Sega and Namco booths from SankeiNews, which shows a quick clip of Deadstorm Pirates 3D.

This user, wx4058, has posted tons of videos from the show, content includes Gundam Extreme Vs., Blazlbue Continuum Shift II, Initial D AA Arcade Stage 6 , Shining force Cross Raid, Pengo, Pac-Man Battle Royale, Darius Burst and more. To get to the JAMMA stuff you’ll have to scroll down past all of the Tokyo Game Show videos.

I am surprised that no one tried to get any video of the autostereoscopic displays that were there, at least as a means of discussing the topic.

We have already discussed the new digital distribution system that Taito has developed (called NESICAxLive) but one area we were waiting to hear more about are the specs for Taito’s new hardware platform, the Type X Zero. Taito unveiled those specs today, here is a rundown:

CPU: Intel Atom230 1.6GHz

GPU/Graphics: nVidia GeForce 9400M, DirectX10 support, 2 video ports

Memory: 1 GB DDR2

OS: Microsoft ® Windows ® Embedded Standard 7

Onboard LAN (10/100/1000Mbps)

Audio: 5.1 ch HD support

OPTIONAL:

2 or 4GB of Memory

HDD: 250GB-1TB or 16GB SSD

You can compare this to the Type X2 hardware here. The system sports a custom BIOS to try and prevent piracy and if I read it correctly, it includes a built-in UPS to handle power interruptions. As you can tell, they aren’t aiming for a high-end machine here but rather something that is cost effective, which other companies have been doing lately as well. The option of adding a 1 TB HDD is probably for the NESICAxLive system so you can store multiple games on one board and at 1 TB it should handle plenty.

In addition to that 4Gamer.net has an upclose picture of the glasses-free PureDepth 3D display that was in the same booth as the Type X Zero. How soon they plan on releasing this technology is anyone’s guess but I imagine that it won’t be long after the Type X Zero is released. Taito hasn’t revealed any 3D games that I know of at the moment but they also aim for other developers to take advantage of their technologies so they could be setting it up for someone else to take the 3D lead. Perhaps Super Street Fighter IV Arcade (which will be at the Tokyo Game Show) would make a great candidate for that but there have been no 3D SSFIV announcements beyond the Nintendo 3DS version so far.

The 48th JAMMA Expo is now underway in Japan and with that comes a flood of news concerning future projects that Japanese developers will be bringing to the market. AM-Net has a number of photos that they have published from the event, with more to come and here are some highlights including new Taito arcade hardware, more 3D gaming from Namco, Sega’s new Pengo and an online content delivery system from Taito that could revolutionize the industry called NESiCAxLIVE. Read on!

UDATE#1:More System Board Y3 details including glasses free 3D display made for arcades; Namco’s Dead Heat goes 3D; Sega and Namco introduce new IC card system called AiME; added a few more pictures + some videos

UPDATE#3: AM-Net and Sega have updated galleries of photos showing crowds gathering around the various booths. I’ve added a few select photos below, including a shot from the new VF5, The Tablecloth Hour and more

UPDATE#6: Just when you think we’re done, we have more content from the show. Thanks to Fillmore Games, a distributor in Japan for providing more pictures of the show. From them we find out that Vulcan-M and Heat Up Hockey were there as well.

Let’s start the week with some Taito news, first with a new game that the company is working on that is a sequel to one of their notable mash-up titles. Music Gun Gun combined two genres that always bring in the players to arcades – light-gun games and music games. With Music Gun Gun 2, we should expect a format similar to the first game with new songs (there will be around 100 songs total) including the Super Mario Bros. Medley plus new songs from Darius Burst Another Chronicle. Taito also has brought in some professional voice actors to do the character voice overs. The game will be testing at the Akihabara Hara Hey on September 4th & 5th. Source details: Game Watch / Music Gun Gun 2 website

Speaking of Darius Burst: Another Chronicle, AkihabaraNews.com has a hands-on preview of the game, along with a set of clear pictures. The reviewers state that they had a great time playing the game and that Taito is developing it as a way to draw more players into arcade centers. That should be the point of every arcade game but DBAC stands a good chance of playing upon nostalgia as well as impressing new players so they get a feel for a unique arcade experience.

UPDATE: Taito has released information on their line-up for the JAMMA show. Both Music Gun Gun 2 and Darius Burst Another Chronicle will be there but they also will be presenting a sequel to one of the strangest arcade games to come out in recent memory with their Dining Table Flipping game Part 2. Here’s the Taito JAMMA page.

Let’s start the week with some Taito news, first with a new game that the company is working on that is a sequel to one of their notable mash-up titles. Music Gun Gun combined two genres that always bring in the players to arcades – light-gun games and music games. With Music Gun Gun 2, we should expect a format similar to the first game with new songs (there will be around 100 songs total) including the Super Mario Bros. Medley plus new songs from Darius Burst Another Chronicle. Taito also has brought in some professional voice actors to do the character voice overs. The game will be testing at the Akihabara Hara Hey on September 4th & 5th. Source details: Game Watch / Music Gun Gun 2 website

Speaking of Darius Burst: Another Chronicle, AkihabaraNews.com has a hands-on preview of the game, along with a set of clear pictures. The reviewers state that they had a great time playing the game and that Taito is developing it as a way to draw more players into arcade centers. That should be the point of every arcade game but DBAC stands a good chance of playing upon nostalgia as well as impressing new players so they get a feel for a unique arcade experience.

UPDATE: Taito has released information on their line-up for the JAMMA show. Both Music Gun Gun 2 and Darius Burst Another Chronicle will be there but they also will be presenting a sequel to one of the strangest arcade games to come out in recent memory with their Dining Table Flipping game Part 2. Here’s the Taito JAMMA page.

Last year Taito contributed a new game to the often quirky world of Japanese arcade games called Ultra Low Dining Table(scroll almost halfway down on the link for videos; it’s also pictured to the right in the photo above), where the object of the game was to pound on a small table controller until the game reached a point where you flipped the table up, attempting to destroy every breakable object on the screen as possible. Perhaps quirky is an understatement with that game but at least it’s a fresh idea. Now that idea has spurned another game dealing with what we can call table-based controls or maybe “tableized” controllers with The Tablecloth Hour, which was testing at the Taito Station in Shibuya, Japan this weekend.

The premise behind this looks simple enough as it’s based upon the idea of pulling a tablecloth from under a place setting. It’s one of those actions that will generally result in an expensive experiment for many people but perhaps with the Tablecloth Hour you’ll be able to practice enough with the virtual version of fast tablecloth pulling to become adept at the real thing (ok, that is doubtful). It’s very unlikely that this game will be seen outside of Japan, I can’t imagine how often the cloth to this will need replacing but at least this is another example of the kind of creative games that can be done, and done best despite their quirkiness, in arcades.

The announcement of the new Darius arcade in Japan has caused quite a stir and while at the moment the game has only been announced for a Japanese release, Taito has been quiet on the international possibilities. So I decided to send them an e-mail, using an address that Taito had shared sometime ago on their Twitter account for contacting them about the company’s international products. Today, I received a response, a small part of which I’ll share here(the other parts covers the game’s stats which we’ve seen):

Re international release, this is still under discussion, and definitely the comment/trackback on your web site will help us to make a final decision!):

Be an Arcade Hero! If you want to see the new Darius get a better chance outside of Japan, then respectfully let Taito know your feelings about it. They can be contacted at this address(change the AT to @): globalsupportATtaito.co.jp. Put “Darius Burst Another Chronicle International Release” in the subject line, mention that you saw this on Arcade Heroes and tell them why you want to play DBAC in an arcade near you. You can also contact Taito on their Twitter channel, they are quite friendly and receptive via this source too so it can’t hurt: http://twitter.com/TaitoCorp